Have you played the black dwarves (BTB)

Ha ha !

At last !

I' going to buy my black dwarves next week (maybe the next one).

I finally chose the mantic game cheap option

1 slave orc regiment for informer
1 immortal regiment for dwarves & some heroes
1 conclave for heroes

Still... I wonder if I should invest in an engine of chaos and mancatchers...

Do they worth it ?

I have played about 10 games now with the BtB Black Dwarfs into our campaign. So whatever wisdom I have from that it's yours.

I chose not to start with a Chaos Engine, it will leave you trailing behind from the start while not contributing very much and even being a liability as you need resources to control it and protect it. I do want one if not for anything but the fluff and coolness of my own made Chaos Engine on the table. Mancatchers have no use untill you get the CE but once you do you can start to make it work for you with captures.

One thing I personally think is a bit overpowered and might cause serious friction between players over the course of a campaign is the capability of the Black Dwarfs to capture enemy warriors. This does 2 things, they are taken from the roster as long as they are imprisoned and are dead when sacrificed AND you gain their equipment, this is a potential source of income next to none if you go hunting for the bulked out warriors.

So what I have done so far is prepare my 2 Gaolers for the use of Mancatchers. One especially, invest in Mighty Blow (+1 Str), Strike to Injure (+1 Injury) (and whatever other skills you think might help) to make sure you increase odds of you making the kill (capture) with the Mancatcher.

Other advice from my experiences:
- Blunderbusses are limited but have a huge fear factor and they can be quite effective at times. Get 2 asap for your Gaolers to rack in exp and crowd control. I used 2 from the start.
- Bull Centaur, very expensive for his stats but with his movement very handy for the slow dwarfs. Tool him up with armor and a shield (morningstar) asap.
- Informers, pretty good and cheap. Get a bow to start out. Ranged 24" Not bad for 25 gold.
- Chaos Dwarfs henchmen. Your only way to increase your hero slots. So get as many as you can as as soon as you can. Money makes Mordheim go around. More heroes is more money =)

At this point my Black Dwarfs lead the campaign, can't complain about luck but still it says something about their potential as well. I'll let you know more when I get my Chaos Engine into a few games.

Here my startup list, if I remember correctly.
Sorcerer 85
Bull Centaur 2xmace 106
Gaoler, Blunderbuss, mace 83
Gaoler, Blunderbuss, mace 83
Chaos Dwarf1 2xmace 46
Chaos Dwarf2 2xmace 46
Informer1, bow 25
Informer2, bow 25
Total:499

Cheers

Hey thx for the tips !

So no Engine at start...

Its rather logic... better to equip yourself for battle before trying to catch ennemies...

At first I tought to go Like this

125 - Engine of chaos
91 - Sorcerer (Mace x2)
75 - Gaoler (Mancatcher)
75 - Gaoler (Mancatcher)
110 - Bull centaur (Axe x2)

23 - Informer (Sling, Mace x2)

499 Total


But now I'd rather go like this

91 - Sorcerer (Mace x2)
93 - Gaoler (Steel whip, mace, Bluderbuss)
86 - Gaoler ( Helmet, Mace x2, Blunderbuss)
110 - Bull centaur (Helmet, Axe x2)

48 - Chaos Dwarf (Mace, Shield)
48 - Chaos Dwarf (Mace, Shield)

Total 496

I have my henchmen equipped with shields because I want to keep kills for my heroes and also, henchmen are more vulnerable to serious injuries (1/3 = death)

We played with an Engine of Chaos in our campaign. I had no problem with it. Our BD player didn't have much luck capturing enemies though for two reasons...
1) Dwarfs are slow and battles were often over before the Gaolers got into combat, and
2) Two warbands were Beastmen so most of their warriors were not 'human sized' warriors and therefore could not be captured.

Also, the rules reward building up captured warriors instead of sacrificing them immediately. This means that there is the opportunity for warbands to release their captured comrades. Hopefully it would not cause friction in your group but it does depend on the type of people that you have playing.

The Engine of Chaos is a vehicle and therefore has all of the limitations that a vehicle provides (e.g. it can lose control, if it is left unattended at the end of a battle then it is lost to the winning team, etc). I don't think that having it is too overpowered because it is also an expensive liability.

I think than ''human size'' means characters that fit on on 20mm/25mm base...

Orcs, possessed, some mutants, etc ... are also bigger than humans. I dont think they are immune to be captured...

Werekin is the man that can answer this ... lets hope he will read this topic.


About the engine ... I wonder if you can use it to trample ennemies ?

Ya, the CE in itself is not overpowered. I just feel the side-effect of permanently losing a warrior without a Serious Injury roll AND taking the equipment via a capture is a bit overpowered and possibly breeding bad blood between players. But yes it depends on the group as well, I discussed this with my group before the campaign and they were ok with it, and they also are a very gentle sportsmanlike group so I am sure it will be fine.

As far as the mancatcher is concerned, I would say anything with the +1 to hit with missiles for being a large target cannot be captured via the mancatchers. (and neither can animals as per description) Anything else is fair game and imho so are any beastmen aside from the Minotaur ofcourse.

Oh by the way. For your Black Dwarf player, well any dwarf player I guess. Invest in a flying carpet if it is available in your campaign. It's a great item for anyone let alone slow dwarfs.

I am reading you! In case I miss a thread like this on Fire Dwarfs, someone please PM me to make me aware cheers.

Talk of captives is topical right now. It’s something I wanted to blog about this season and I’ve relabelled all my posts on Liber Malefic accordingly.

For further information on what Chaos Dwarf warbands can do with captives check the 'Prisoners of War' entry on my Hired Swords compilation article Swords of the Empire - Mordheim Compendium of Hired Swords

Quote :

Prisoners of War
One of the by-products of the Mordheim campaign rules is that warriors can be taken captive by another warband. When a Hero is captured as a result of rolling on the Serious Injuries Chart, limited options are available.

Playing a Border Town Burning campaign or using Hired Swords, can lead to other situations where warriors are captured. Consequently, despicable warbands being played in the spirit of their character might fulfil the unpleasant objective of taking prisoners and putting them to work or death.

Dark Elf and Chaos Dwarf warbands will never consent to freeing captured warriors. Any captured once-proud individuals can be put to far better use as a slave. Browbeaten warriors suffer the same humiliating fate, to be chain-ganged then forced to search for treasure and scavenge for wyrdstone!

After a battle nominate which captured warriors are being assigned to search for treasure and wyrdstone. At the end of the Exploration procedure roll a D6 for each captured warrior who was nominated. Add the results to the total score from the Exploration dice result used to calculate the number of wyrdstones shards or treasure found.

Furthermore, on a roll of 1 the captured warrior has mustered the strength and courage to bite back against his oppressors! The warrior has slipped past the fiends guard and returns to his original warband a Hero. Treat a Henchman as receiving 'The lads got talent' and the Hero gains D6+2 Experience points. If the roll made was a 6 the prisoner has been overworked, exposed to too much wyrdstone, and suffered so terribly at the hands of his tormentors that he has expired! Either result means removing the captured warrior from the Dark Elf or Chaos Dwarf player’s roster.

If Hired Swords or Dramatis Personae are captured then they are treated in exactly the same way as any other warrior. Alternatively, if the Hired Sword is eligible to be hired by the warband then treat the warrior as having been hired. No hire fee is necessary but any upkeep cost must still be met after each battle.

Models that cannot be captured by a Chaos Dwarf with a man-catcher (or Clan Skyre/Moulder skaven with a spike-jawed snatcher, yes they can use them too in Marienburg!) should be easily determined by checking the entry for the target model. If it counts as being large then it cannot be grabbed!

I have uploaded a scenario from ‘Mutiny in Marienburg’ called Powder Bridge that includes some material on non-player character hostages.

This is not my full package for guidelines on this subject. I have written a special scenario for the campaign called Swap Meat which Eliazar played during his recent visit. This scene provides more detail on using hostage markers as scenario objectives.

Captured models from enemy warbands form collateral in campaigns. While it is true that players can become despondent when capture experiences occur, there are a number of ways this can happen in the game rules; Serious Injury, Man-catcher, Bounty Hunter Hired Sword, Slaver Hired Sword, Ogre Slavemaster Hired Sword.

In the Marienburg setting there are a few additional means for this situation happening. These include;

1. Slaver special skill for Mobsters warband.
2. Slaver special skill for warband leader from a warband achievement from completing objectives from ‘The Body Trade’ plot.
3. Warriors being placed under arrest by warbands following the ‘Guardians of the Peace’ plot. Guidelines for this will be included with a scenario called Dead Freight.

In my campaign the matter of captured warband members has become a hot topic. It is still a delicate subject. The principals for freeing captured Heroes and Henchmen (remember Hired Swords count as switching sides when the capturing warband can normally hire them!) are found in the Mordheim Rulebook on page 119;

Quote :

1. The warrior may be ransomed at a price set by the captor or exchanged for one of their warband who is being held captive.
2. Captives may be sold to slavers at a price of D6x5 gold crowns.
3. Undead may kill their captive and gain a new zombie.
4. The Possessed may sacrifice the prisoner. The leader of the warband will gain +1 Experience if they do so.
5. Captives who are exchanged or ransomed retain all their weapons, armour and equipment; if captives are sold, killed, or turned to Zombies, their weaponry etc. is retained by their captors.

Using campaign achievements earned through completing warband objectives, I have found it is possible to reinterpret how a certain kind of warband must respond when taking captives. The reason for this was to provide agreeable stories that will allow players to return Heroes to their starting warband! Here are some examples of this.

Plot: Drowning the Witch - 10 Campaign Points
Warbands: Witch Hunters, Sisters of Sigmar and Mercenaries hiring a Warrior-Priest of Sigmar may follow this plot.
Torture: Instead of searching for a rare item during the post battle sequence, the leader of a Witch Hunters warband can organise an interrogation to coax information out of an unwilling suspect. On a successful Strength test, the torturer prizes a secret from a captured Hero. The Witch Hunters gain 1 extra Campaign Point. Whichever warband the captured warrior belonged to loses 1 Campaign Point and the warrior is returned to their warband. The captured Hero is released after being interrogated.

Plot: The Body Trade – 10 Campaign Points
Warbands: Dark Elf Corsairs, Mobsmen, Norse Explorers, Arabyan Raiders, Brionnese Pirates, Maneaters, Marauders of Chaos and Chaos Dwarf warbands may follow this plot.
Slaver Ring: The warband joins a slaver ring. The warband may trade any captured warriors from other warbands. The warband leader gains the 'Slaver' skill. There may never be more than two warriors with this skill in the warband at any one time. Any Hero or Henchman put out of action in hand-to-hand combat by a Slaver will automatically be captured (see 'Captured' on the Serious Injuries chart, p.119 of the Mordheim Rulebook). Heroes or Henchmen captured may not be eaten or ransomed to another warband during the post battle sequence. Heroes or Henchmen captured may be exchanged with their starting warband for hostages or captured warriors. Whenever another player sells captives to slavers at a price of D6x5 gold crowns, they should be offered to warbands in the slaver ring. If two or more warbands join a slaver ring roll dice to determine who buys each captive.

Plot: Gaze of the Gods – 5 Campaign Points
Warbands: Beastmen and Fimir warbands, Cults of Chaos including Cult of the Possessed, Carnival of Chaos and Stromfels Reavers may follow this plot.
Sacrificial Stone: Any Hero or Henchman captured by the warband must be sacrificed, despite any arrangement with a Hired Sword that was hired by the warband. ie, Slaver. Instead of searching for a rare item during the post battle sequence, one or more of the Heroes in the warband may visit the Sacrificial Stone to participate in a ceremony of sacrifice. Roll once on the Ceremony of Sacrifice Chart for each sacrifice offered to the Ruinous Powers. Apply a +1 modifier to the roll for each Hero beyond the first to participate in a ceremony. On a roll of 1 the captive will always escape: 1-5 Escaped. The warrior has slipped his bonds and returns safely back to his starting warband. The warrior (or his Henchman group) gains D3 Experience points. 6 Sacrificed. Blood of the victim is spilled across of the altar. Each Hero participating in the ceremony gains 1 Experience point.

After our last battle, a player with a Chaos warband returned a Hero to the Mobsmen by purposefully letting him escape during a sacrifice! The two players have entered into a treaty of sorts. Ok so if he had rolled a 6 then the Hero would have been slain but it makes for a compelling story!

Regards,

Werekin

That is really interesting.

Now, I'm just drooling a bit more for The Mutiny in Marienburg supplement. Thanks werekin .

Its pretty interesting to see that you develop something about captured warriors. Indeed, the core rules do not offers much about it. The hopes that a captured can escape or is released after interrogation will probably calm down many angry players about the fact that warriors are condemned to death whenever they are in the hands of the ennemy.

You also offer a glimpse of the new warbands, Mobsmen, New skaven clans, Fimir, Reavers, Pirates... I'm so eager to see what you have done...

Regards werekin.

Oh yes it helps to allay the players fears in these delicate situations!

There is already a warband list for each of the four great clans. I really like Tommy Punk's work on Clan Moulder and I have a kind of properly formatted version of my own for that somewhere on my hard-drive. It will go up in the rules section on Liber Malefic at some point but it wasn't specifically intended to feature in MiM.

However, the skaven do put in a significant appearance. Chris Kneller wanted to play the villainous role of a Rear-Admiral to Skyre Warlord Riskin Tatter-Ear whole rules the burrow town beneath Marienburg! How could I refuse him his wish!

As such there is an almighty skaven warband list for the Marienburg setting under production which will be accompanied by a special Subterranean Events Chart. The chart will allow skaven players to scheme to their hearts content in the post battle seqeuence while other players waste their time in the marketplace.

The skaven warband is comprised of an uneasy alliance between the Skyre Warp-Engineers and the Skurvy Pirate-Rats crewing the vermin armada.

I think that the rest of the new warbands have been hinted at one time or another although I have yet to post an official statement concerning them. There was a post called Popular Items about new warbands made on the campaign blog last April. Obviously this wasn't a factual representation on the matter but there was some degree of truth carried in the announcement. Skroats for example, was my own warped way of alluding to the arrival of a new skaven list to play with.

Two of the main factions not mentioned in that comedic post were the 'cops & robbers' but as hobby material has been posted here on the forum by other hobbyist it has become common knowledge. There will be warband lists for Watchmen and Mobsmen alllowing players to collect and fight with Criminal Cartels and Watch Patrols. How cool is that!?

Ohhh.. the watchmen ! I like this ALOT !

This is so ''fitting'' for a setting like an inhabited city of Marienburg ! Sure the locals would like the rulers to apply laws and eradicate those nightfights in the city !

You're also working on some kind of ''undercity'' for skavens (and possibly Chaos Cults) in the sewers !! THAT is cool ! Its true that I have a problem with a black skaven going free to the market...

Have you seen the Skryre Skaven warband that have been made... Its pretty cool... If you havent you should get an eye on it ... This can brings new ideas.

Lets hope you keep up your good work... And I'll pray for Mutiny in Marienburg releases before next year X-mas... LOL

Frogprince wasn't a fan of that Skyre warband list from the Araby campaign.

His vision was clear. The game material needs to detail the clan's nature of being kleptomaniac tinker rats. I concurred that we should develop a new list fitting with the lifestyle and death-style of warp engineers whilst exposing their maritime activity.

There is some brilliant story material on Skyre warlock engineers written by C.L. Werner which has inspired hours of playtesting.

I tought about this one...

http://www.accursedknowledge.0catch.com/files/mordheim/Clan%20Skryre.pdf


I like it, tough I never tried to play it.

I have indeed seen the Prisoner of War rules at some time but we have never used them so far since they are not in the standard BtB ruleset and I simply haven't thought of them anymore since we started. But I do like it a lot better then sending prisoners off for bonus exp and it suits the fluff also better. My captures in the Chaos Engine (to a max of 6) can be put to work generating extra income to offset the risk of using a wagon such as the CE. Giving the other player the chance for an escape on a 1 or a rescue through conventional means, capturing the CE, or getting one of the keys from the Gaolers and opening the cage. Very nice yes.

There is one other issue that really gnaws at me. Which is a little sidejump and might deserve it's own topic. But wagons in general need some expanded rules to make them more usefull and viable, escpecially if you run a Merchants Caravan.

Some thoughts I had on the topic.
Wagon Upgrades:

- Upgrade to Armored War Wagon: +75GC Rare:8
Cover against missiles, defended obstacle, -1 movement, No storage, Max 6 Warriors (not including driver)

- Upgrade to Armored Trade Wagon: +75GC Rare:8
Cover against missiles, defended obstacle, -1 movement, Max 2 Warriors (not including driver), less storage (max 1000 GC)

- Draft Horses (or similar suited animals) Barding: 4+ armor save

- Abandoned (Adjustment of Merchant Caravan rule): wagon is only lost when the owner band has routed with no controlling driver AND the enemy warband has a driver/controller in basecontact.

- No randomized shooting:
Shoot at wagon +1
Shoot at wheels -1
Shoot at Horses no Modifier (LOS rules apply)
Shoot at occupants no Modifier

This might be tweaked ofcourse but the general idea is clear.

I just wondered about something...

The engine is sold 125 GC in the Black dwarves equipment list but 195 in his description...

125 GC is the price for starting warbands oinly or it can always be bought at this price?

@Goglutin - The Skyre warband list your link is a variation for the same one in Relics of the Crusades, an Araby supplement.

Starting price for an Engine of Chaos is lower so that starting warbands have an incentive to purchase one at the beginning of a campaign. It costs full price later or to buy a 2nd Engine.

@Warshades - You're on the right track with vehicle upgrades being needed for Merchant players who wish to invest in protecting a trade wagon. I have a list of options to 'customise' boats and wagon in a document entitled Marketplace. Warbands have the option of visiting market location in the post battle sequence, including a Shipwright or Cartwright at the Boatyard.

So far as losing wagons goes, this is how it works. A vehicle will only be abandoned when the player's warband has routed with no controlling crew and the enemy warband has at least one warrior in contact with it.

Regards,

Stuart

@Werekin,

Is that document already available, can't find it online on BtB or LM.

Caravan Merchants "Abandoned" rule RAW doesn't state that the winning players need to control the wagon, but as we both agree it is better yes, I'll forward this idea to our group. Ezekial will be happy as he is the resident merchant player at the moment

I agree that the rules for wagons stated by Werekin are better than the current rules. Not quite as harsh.

@Werekin... my goodness MiM is sounding more and more ambitious every time I hear about it!

It will take forever and a day to finish MiM, like BTB did!

This alternative interpretation of managing wagon thefts is not so different from what the current rules state. The point is whether a warband losing all of crew should be allowed to voluntarily rout and recover their unmanned vehicle. This is more relevant when they've been shot at by enemy models, because if they crew through losing hand-to-hand combat then we can assume their enemies have reached and taken the boat or wagon.

Marketplace is an article saved on my desktop and iPhone for our post battle sequence sessions. A good chunk of it is completed! There are a few entries which still need work, including the Boatyard.

Maintaining and upgrading a vehicle can be costly. We've reached the point of our campaign where this can start to happen soon. The richest player in our campaign doesn't currently have a boat but the skaven player has built (or stole parts needed to build) a barge. I have my trawler which players can use. The elves should really be using something which looks more like a speedboat! And the Strigany will need to build an ark if they plan on housing their menagerie of birds and stray animals.

If anyone knows what a Gyroscopic Oscillator is supposed to do can you please let me know. Apparently you can get one of these fitted at the Shipyard. If it's some kind of black-box then perhaps it can using as a tracking device when another warband has stolen your vehicle!

I would think that the Gyroscope is used to stabilize ships. But that sounds like quite advanced tech for the old world no? And it also suggests then some sort of weather/water rules that might de-stabilize a ship/boat.

So I believe the only real question here is, how much to fit a cannon, and how many can I possibly fit on my merchant vessel. Harrr!

An interesting theory. Do you see any reason to stabilize boats? There is one on the Marienburg Landship but nobody seems to know what it's for!

Surely no more than one cannon per river barge.

Is your merchant sailing a ship-of-the-line?

@Werekin

Just a question ...

How much time it took to complete Border town burning ?

How much percent of Mutiny in marienburg is done by now?

werekin wrote:

An interesting theory. Do you see any reason to stabilize boats? There is one on the Marienburg Landship but nobody seems to know what it's for!

their appears to be a wiki entry on the Gyroscope.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anti-rolling_gyro

Small section of the text
"Ship stabilising gyroscopes are a technology developed in the 19th century and early 20th century and used to stabilise roll motions in ocean-going ships. It lost favour in this application to hydrodynamic roll stabiliser fins because of reduced cost and weight. However, more recently (since the 1990s) a growing interest in the device has reemerged for low speed roll stabilisation of vessels. The gyroscope does not rely on the forward speed of the ship to generate a roll stabilising moment and therefore has shown to be attractive to motor yacht owners for use whilst at an anchorage."

werekin wrote:

Surely no more than one cannon per river barge.
Is your merchant sailing a ship-of-the-line?

It was more of a joke, since I assumed a cannon is to powerfull in a mordheim setting. But I did just got 2 Ainsty ships in this week, Sloop and Merchant, awesome models. They will get their proper place on the battlefield sooner or later I am sure. I have no warbands yet with any maritime equipment.

@Gogutlin,

I cannot speak for Werekin ofcourse but I have been working on a series of scenario's that affect each other. So scenario 1 affects the settings of scenario 2 etc throughout the campaign, I like that idea. It's easy enough to come up with stuff, but translating idea's into a balanced competative scenario takes a lot of time.

Warshades wrote:

werekin wrote:

Surely no more than one cannon per river barge.
Is your merchant sailing a ship-of-the-line?

It was more of a joke, since I assumed a cannon is to powerfull in a mordheim setting. But I did just got 2 Ainsty ships in this week, Sloop and Merchant, awesome models. They will get their proper place on the battlefield sooner or later I am sure. I have no warbands yet with any maritime equipment.

That is when you buy a Gyroscopic Oscillator... to stop the river barge from overturning when TWO cannons are shot from the same side at the same time!